PJP’s Statement on Marcellus Williams
In 2001, Marcellus Williams was convicted of a crime that he did not commit. Before the unjust and inhumane execution of Williams, thousands of people signed petitions nationally demanding that Williams not be executed including the family of the victim, the prosecutor, and the jurors who were involved in the court proceedings.
Wrongful convictions have been a national problem since colonizers stole land and forced their way of living onto Indigenous people.
Since 1989...
3,200+ people have been exonerated in the U.S.
105 of those exonerations were in Ohio
Half of the exonerations were of Black people and
8 of these exonerations were of Black men
These numbers combined add up to 30,000 years lost in the prison system.
This is another reminder about the unjust treatment of Black people since we were enslaved and forced into free labor. The 13th Amendment, which was passed in 1865 and disguised as a piece of legislation to “free Black people from enslavement” came with a clause that stated:
Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.”(via congress.gov).
This has enabled the state to pass laws we call “black codes” to enslave Black people into convict leasing; a fancy word for slavery. While convict leasing “ended” in the 1930s, it was replaced by the modern-day prison system where black people make up 40% of the incarcerated population despite only making up 13% of the United States population.
There is a pattern here in America. As the masses continue to grow consciousness, unjust laws are replaced with more palatable unjust laws that ultimately have the same goal: to keep Black people enslaved, underserved, and overlooked. This is why we must continue to analyze these laws, demand our voices be heard, build Black power, and organize.
People’s Justice Project is appreciative and supportive of the Innocence Project, Equal Justice Initiative, and other national organizations that are doing work to free our people. We also want to acknowledge the work in Ohio with organizations like Ohio Innocence Project and Ohio Public Defender’s Wrongful Conviction Project.
Marcellus Williams should still be alive today. People’s Justice Project is deeply saddened by this loss and will continue to do the work and move forever forward, and unafraid together.
